Bonds

The California Legislature has put the largest public works bond package in history on the November ballot. The bonds are unnecessary and will burden the state with massive debt.

The $10.4 billion education bond is unnecessary as school construction in new developments are already funded by development fees. Most of the remaining school construction would not be needed if only children that are here legally were enrolled.

All school construction should be built using the California Uniform Building Code. The depression era Field Act, which makes school construction prohibitively expensive, should be abolished.

The $2.9 billion housing bond will not make housing affordable in California. Instead of bonds, the government should allow the construction of more housing units. High density residential is the most profitable type of real estate development and it can also help solve our housing shortage. If cities relied more on property tax rather than sales tax for their revenue, they would make better land use decisions and allow more homes to be built instead of subsidizing big box retail development.

Over $4 billion from sales tax on gasoline has been raised since Proposition 42 went into effect in July of 2003. That money is supposed to go into transportation but Governor Schwarzenegger spent the money on other programs. The $19.9 billion transportation bond (Prop 1B) will waste more money on rail boondoggles and artificially high prevailing wages. If the gas tax and vehicle license fees went to expanding our freeways and legislation was written to allow private toll roads for commercial trucks, commuters would not have to deal with the day-to-day gridlock that wastes their time and gas.

All of the California taxpayers should not be on the hook for the $4.1 billion (Prop 1E) in flood protection for the Central Valley. If property owners feel that their levees are inadequate, they can pass a local property assessment tax and require future flood zone developers to pay fees for levee upgrades.

We should not burden our children with these massive bonds when we can fix our neglected infrastructure without new debt and the higher taxes that invariably follow.

"Bonds are seductive. They promise immediate gratification but they conceal a heavy price. They are certainly the most expensive way to finance projects, costing two dollars to retire every dollar of debt. Moreover, the state’s borrowing capacity is finite, requiring careful attention to priorities, since debt once issued cannot be rescinded – only repaid. And every dollar borrowed by this generation reduces the ability of the next generation to meet its own needs."
--Senator Tom McClintock